Strictly Speaking
by Svenja The Strange
Summary: It is a fact of Physics that, strictly speaking, nothing ever touches on the atomic level. That fact bothers Sherlock. - A short johnlock ficlet. Rating for very mild sexual content.


**Note:** Just a tiny johnlock ficlet I wrote after reading a fact on tumblr. Not betad. Sorry for possible mistakes.

**Strictly Speaking **

It is a fact of Physics that, strictly speaking, nothing ever touches on the atomic level. Strictly speaking, all things just hover in space microscopically apart from each other and can never truly come together. It has to do with the electrons surrounding the nucleus of an atom and the fact that particles with the same charge repel each other.

Philosophically, Sherlock presumes, the matter can possibly be argued if one deems philosophical arguments to be of any relevance, which he doesn't.

The Physics of atoms have never been of vital importance to his work either and therefore of no importance to him. He should really have deleted this superfluous fact about the Physics of touching from the archives of his mind palace long, long ago when it wasn't yet of any relevance to him. But he didn't. And it should not be of any relevance to him now. But it is.

Now, thanks to the ever active, ever spinning mechanics of his mind, this insufferably ridiculous fact has started to honestly trouble him.

He thinks about it a lot – just like he thinks a lot in general. _All the time_, actually. And probably too much, as pointed out by John often before. Sherlock used to not listen to him then. Now, he reckons, it's not all unlikely that John is right, occasionally. He definitely thinks too much about that particular fact and he might just think too much altogether sometimes.

He thinks as he kisses John lightly on the lips before turning back to his current experiment. And while a part of his attention is registering the soft, moist feel of John's lips brushing against his, and a part of him is roughly calculating the decay rate of human tissue under the influence of a degenerative virus, a third part is thinking about that infuriating fact that nothing ever really touches, strictly speaking.

It would have appealed to him some time ago that, strictly speaking, he is atomically untouchable and forever isolated from everything and everyone in the entire universe that is not already part of himself. And even the parts he's made of.

But that was before he met John. John, who feels like he is more part of Sherlock than any part of Sherlock's body ever was or could be. And how can this fact be true then?

Because it would mean that, strictly speaking, Sherlock can never - however hard he tries - never _really_ touch John's lips with his when they kiss. And that fact bothers him more than he should allow himself to be bothered. _Silly_. _Sentimental._ _Human Error._

There are moments when the constant thinking about _that_ fact makes him feel so much lonelier than he ever felt before meeting John, even though they are lying right next to each other, tangled in each other limps or actually _in_ each other.

There are moments when the thought of having even the tiniest, microscopic, atomic space between them is unendurable.

In those moments it is nearly driving him mad with an irrational yearning for closeness and the unbearable desire to make the contours of his body melt gapless into the soft warmth of John's skin. It is then that John sometimes has to gasp a soft and not entirely displeased "_Ow!_" when Sherlock's grip intensifies until his fingers dig into the soft tissue of John's sensitive thighs to leave purple bruises or drag along the line of John's spine with such strong pressure that it is sensible in every vertebra. It is then that Sherlock locks his arms around John like the iron fangs of screw clamps and buries his face in the nook of his neck to bath in his scent for as long as breathing is possible. It is then that he grits his teeth so hard they gnash and hurt because a horrible feeling of separation stretches through his chest as wide as a universe.

It is in those moments that this obscenely aggressive sensation of longing to be _one_ is almost ripping him open and crushing him into a ball at the same time.

It helps that even though they are, strictly speaking, just hovering over and around and in each other, it _feels _like they're touching with every fiber of their being. It helps that, while they move in a joint rhythm, Sherlock feels the skimming of John's legs against his own, the pressure on his scalp and the light tug in his hair as John runs his hands through his curls. It helps that he feels the hot wetness of John mouth leave moist spots on his neck that cool in the air as the roaming pair of lips moves on to caress other parts. It helps that he can feel the friction of their flesh grinding together in sweet pleasure.

Yes, that helps.

But what usually keeps Sherlock's ribcage from shattering into pieces with the irresistible expansion of yearning that is swelling painfully like a balloon filling up with water until the point of bursting is the way that John looks at him in those moments.

His blue eyes fix Sherlock with such intensity that, for once, the thinking stops. The ever turning wheels of Sherlock's hyperactive mind stutter and then come to halt completely. And then there is nothing but silence – silence and the feeling and taste and scent of John. And the eyes that look at him like this.

It doesn't really matter then that, strictly speaking, they are not really touching on the atomic level. Because people - and he would probably not admit to believing this and he would probably not even admit to thinking about not work relevant things like this at all - are not just made of solid matter that consists of atoms. People are more than the sum of their parts. Because when John is looking at him like this Sherlock _knows_ they are touching in another way. He knows some non material elements of them are merging into each other like compatible fluids in a chemical solution. The Physics don't matter, solely the reality of the feeling does.

And so, Sherlock muses, perhaps the philosophical aspect is relevant after all.

But about one thing Sherlock is sure: the notion "mind over matter" has never had a deeper, truer meaning for him. _Silly_? Probably. _Sentimental?_ Embarrassingly so. _Human Error_? Of the gravest kind. But when two minds, two thoughts, two feelings reach out for each other they are not bound by the laws of Physics. So strictly speaking they do, after all, touch.


End file.
